OK, so, yes, tomorrow RENEGADE MAGIC will officially be published, and I am a jumble of nerves and hope and exhilaration, and tomorrow's journal entry will most definitely reflect all of that...

...but today I want to point out something incredibly cool that Patrick has just done.

Now, here's the back story. I met Patrick almost eleven years ago, when we both attended the Clarion West fantasy & science fiction writing workshop. As part of that workshop, each student has to write one story a week, and every story gets critiqued by all the rest of the students.

My submission packet was critiqued on Day One of the workshop - and Patrick was by far the most ruthless of the critiquers. His critique burned. I smiled, nodded politely, took notes...and swore that I would have my revenge! I sat down two days later with his first story, determined to slash it to pieces!

Then I started reading...and within less than two paragraphs, I was hooked. I forgot all about revenge, or even about critique. I was completely in love with the story.

Not too long afterwards, I also fell in love with him, too. But that's a different story - although I fell in love with his writing first, so they're intimately connected. :) (And as a side-note: he is still my most ruthless critiquer, and I am so grateful for it - because his critiques always, always help me improve my work.)

It didn't take long for lots of other people to start agreeing with me about Patrick's short stories. He sold his first story to Realms of Fantasy less than a year later. Since then, he's sold seventeen more stories to various magazines including Interzone, Strange Horizons, Black Static, Realms of Fantasy (again and again and again!), and also Year's Best Fantasy, which reprinted his story "Crab Apple". In other words: he writes wonderful short stories.

Now, he's reprinting some of those published stories as ebooks, with gorgeous covers. "Uncle Vernon's Lie" was first published in Realms of Fantasy (after being written as a birthday present for me!), and it's suitable for just about any age group from MG onwards.

"Crab Apple" and "At the Gates" are both YA fantasy stories. "Crab Apple" was published in RoF and Year's Best Fantasy; "At the Gates" (which is darker) was published in Black Static.

"Finisterre" and "Camelot" are both definitely for adults only, but fabulous. "Finisterre" was originally published in The Third Alternative and "Camelot" was published in Interzone.

"A Veil, A Meal, and Dust" is a space opera that would be fine for ages 12 and up, and it was originally published in Ideomancer.

Bone Roads is an anthology of 9 of his stories - 8 reprints (from sources including Realms of Fantasy, Strange Horizons and Black Static and 1 original - all of which would be fine for older teenagers or adults.

Right now, the stories are only available for sale on Amazon (including all the various Amazon branches around the world), but they'll soon be up on Smashwords and elsewhere as well. Right now, you can find out more about the stories and find their "buy" links either by looking up "Patrick Samphire" on Amazon or by reading his blog entry here.

These are wonderful stories which got a great reception when they were first published in paper magazines - but I'm so glad that the rise of ebooks is making it possible for far more people to read them, even long after those particular magazine issues have left bookstore shelves.

Oh HOORAY! Clarion West was such an incredible experience. I've never in my life gotten to watch my writing get so much better in such a short period before - and that's even aside from all the rest of the amazing stuff that happens there.

And aren't the covers beautiful? Patrick designed them all himself. Now I'm bugging him to design some for some of my short stories too! ;p